Robert Bruce Montgomery was born in Buckinghamshire in 1921, and was a golden age crime writer as well as a successful concert pianist and composer. Under the pseudonym Edmund Crispin, he wrote 9 detective novels and 42 short stories. In addition to his reputation as a leader of the mystery genre, he contributed to many periodicals and newspapers and edited sci–fi anthologies. After the golden years of the 1950s he retired from the limelight to Devonshire until his death in 1978.

‘Both the mature and the discerning young choose to pick up one of Crispin's beautifully turned crime novels’ The Times‘Crispin isn't in it for the mystery, but for the enigmas’ Guardian‘His books are full of high spirits and excellent jokes, with constant literary allusions and an atmosphere of bibulous good humour. But at times the mood turns darker, and Crispin is capable of passages of both genuine suspense and ingenius deduction’ Daily Telegraph‘Crispin is noted for an ability to embellish clever story lines with Marx Brothers touches’ New York Times‘Rightly elevated to classic status’ New York Sun